The Role of Citizens in Post-Apartheid South Africa: a Case-Study of Citizen Involvement in Informal Settlement Projects, eThekwini

by Sarah Cooper-Knock (MA Thesis, Oxford)

Click here to read this thesis in PDF.

Sarah Cooper-Knock spent two and half months participating in the day to day activities of Abahlali baseMjondolo from August 2008.

Click here to read this thesis in an attachment in word (with better layout etc)

Rights, democracy, social movements: Abahlali baseMjondolo: a living politics

Matt Birkinshaw

This dissertation is submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of MA in Understanding and Securing Human Rights of the University of London

Contents

Page

Abstract 1

Chapter One The “zim zims” 3

Chapter Two Rainbow Nation 19

The introduction is here in text but the rest of the thesis is attached below in word.

Introduction

Urbanization is an unavoidable reality. Various reports and data show that people are flocking into cities.

The UN Millennium Development Goals aim to improve the living conditions of 100 million slum-dwellers by 2020. However, the number of slum-dwellers is estimated to increase by nearly 500 million between now and then. In addition, over the next 3 decades, urban growth will bring a further 2 billion people into cities in the Global South, doubling their size to about 4 billion people. These cities are already growing at a rate of about 70 million people per year. Overall almost 180,000 people move into cities every day.